


Out of the Ashes

by purplejellosg1



Category: Fate: The Winx Saga (TV)
Genre: Did I Mention Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Found Family, Friendship, Gen, Light Angst, Not Beta Read, Speculation, just something I’d like to see, spoilers for season one finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-18 21:15:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29496411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplejellosg1/pseuds/purplejellosg1
Summary: Spoilers for the Season One finale. Speculation on season two. Fluff and friendship. Out of the ashes, new beginnings come.
Relationships: Bloom & Farah Dowling, Farah Dowling & Ben Harvey, Farah Dowling & Ben Harvey & Saul Silva, Farah Dowling & Saul Silva, Farah Dowling & Sky, Farah Dowling & Terra Harvey, Farah Dowling/Saul Silva
Comments: 16
Kudos: 130





	Out of the Ashes

**Author's Note:**

> Any mistakes/typos are mine and come from typing this entirely on my phone. Just a little bit of fluffy sweetness because I NEED it.

To say everyone was a little clingy after their reunion was an understatement. In a way, it wasn’t surprising - they had all thought her dead, after all. But in another way, seeing how much they’d missed her, was both surprising and humbling, and Farah would admit only to Saul, who caught her in the act, that it brought her to tears at times.

I. The Girls

At first, she hadn’t noticed. Not really. Bloom had taken to bursting into her office unannounced and uninvited several times before everything had happened with Rosalind and Andreas so it wasn’t anything new.

What was new was that the fire fairy didn’t demand answers Farah couldn’t give her. 

No, she didn’t do that anymore. Instead, she’d stand in front of Farah’s desk, wringing her hands in front of her, asking silly questions about that day’s lessons that Farah knew she knew the answers to.

When Farah realised it was because the young girl wanted to spend time with her - willingly, outside of class - she’d move over to the sofa, invite Bloom to join her and pour them some tea.

After the first couple of times, Bloom’s suitemates got bold and started inviting themselves along, too. 

Stella waltzed in, an air of confidence about her as though she’d been invited, but Farah picked up on her deeply ingrained insecurity and fear of rejection so invited her to join them with a reassuring smile.

Aisha was nervous, too, and Farah caught the young water fairy staring at her sometimes with shimmering eyes, as though she was afraid the Headmistress was going to disappear in front of her eyes. After realising that, Farah made a point to make sure Aisha knew she was just as welcome as the others, and asked her if she’d help out manning the front office again when she had time between her studies.

Musa walked straight in one day and sat on the rug on the floor beside Farah’s legs. She could practically feel the young empath vibrate with so many emotions, her own and her suitemates, so Farah subtly reached out and ran her hand over Musa’s hair. Using just a wisp of her power, she was able to calm and soothe the young woman, who audibly sighed and relaxed back against Farah’s leg. That soon became her place to sit, and no one questioned it.

Terra, sweet Terra, was the most forthright of the girls. She bounced in ahead of Bloom one day, threw her arms around Farah and didn’t let go for a good three or four minutes. Farah didn’t mind at all and hugged her goddaughter back, eyes growing damp when Terra murmured that she “was so worried we lost you, Aunt Farah”. She couldn’t remember the last time the girl had called her that, and it brought back all sorts of memories of being part of Terra’s childhood at Alfea.

Bloom would often find an excuse to linger behind, either to help tidy up or on the guise of having left something behind. On those occasions, the teenager would give Farah an impulsive hug, no longer asking for permission, and then dart of the room as quickly as she’d reappeared, a smile on her face.

It was becoming a tradition, starting with one night a week then extending to twice when the boys caught on and started to attend the first night. They needed a night just for the girls, Stella explained, with the rest of the Winx suite agreeing. 

II. The Boys

Though she’d played an integral part in both Sam and Sky’s upbringing, they’d long since passed the age where being linked to the Headmistress in a personal sense was socially acceptable. 

For Sam, it was bad enough that his father was one of the teachers at the school - he didn’t want everyone knowing the Headmistress was his godmother and surrogate aunt as well. 

Sky, similarly, had found it enough to contend with being the son of the legend that was Andreas of Eraklyon, but everyone knew the Specialist Headmaster was his father in all ways but blood. For word to get out that Farah had taken on the role of maternal figure to him would be too much for his teenage ego.

That was why Farah wasn’t expecting much, if anything, in the way of acknowledgement from them that she’d - temporarily - been lost to them. She saw firsthand how strained Saul’s relationship with Sky was at first following the revelation of Andreas’s apparent death, and was more than content knowing that the two of them were focusing on repairing their relationship. 

She was surprised, then, when Sam turned up at her office unexpectedly one morning before class. He had a new potted plant with him, said his father had asked him to bring it - something Ben would later expose as being a lie. He’d lingered in the office on the pretence of finding the perfect spot for it and then had, just before leaving, swept her up in a tight hug, muttering that he was glad she was okay, before making his escape.

Sky wasn’t so forthright, but then given he was raised by Saul and not Ben, and given the upheaval he’d had with Andreas suddenly reappearing then leaving his life, Farah wasn’t surprised.

She’d also wondered if he’d blame her for lying to him about his fathers fate, too, as she accepted she shared the blame for that with Saul. Her heart breaks for them both when she thinks about it, when she thinks of the unnecessary guilt Saul’s carried around for so many years, and the damage the truth had done to their relationship.

Unlike the others, Sky didn’t come to her office. He waited until after hours, until she’d retired for the night and headed to her suite. She found him loitering outside the door, pacing a groove in the floor.

“Sky?” She queried softly as she approached, not wanting to startle him when she could see he was already on edge. “Is something wrong?”

“No. Yes.” He flushed, tilting his head. “Do you have a minute?”

“Of course.” Though it was special circumstances, Farah still used her powers to check there was no one else in the vicinity before leading him into her suite. It wouldn’t do either of their reputations any good to be seen and have it misconstrued. “Come in.”

No sooner than they were through the door, and it closed behind them, was Sky in her arms. She hadn’t realised he was crying until she felt his tears soak through the material of her dress.

So Farah soothed him with her magic, murmured nonsensical reassurances and rocked him in a way she hadn’t done for many years, providing a release for the pent up emotions the young Specialist had been subjected to.

“I’m sorry, Sky,” she murmured as he began to settle. “I’m sorry we didn’t tell you the truth from the beginning.”

“I know. I understand.” He wiped his cheeks as he pulled away, embarrassment starting to set in. “I’m just... I’m glad you’re back. You and Silva...” He shrugged a shoulder and didn’t say anything more.

He didn’t need to.

Though her role had certainly been more in the background, she knew Sky couldn’t remember his mother and had, until recently, very few memories of his father.

“I’m glad we’re back, too,” she admitted with a smile. 

With another shy smile, Sky ducked his head and let himself out of her suite.

Once the boys discovered the regular meetings of the Winx Club, as Terra dubbed them, they too started turning up at her office. That was why the girls insisted on a second girls only night, so they could talk about all of the gossip, goings on and so and so forth that they couldn’t do alongside their male peers.

III. Ben

It didn’t take long for Ben to figure out where his children were going on an evening, or to invite himself along on the evenings where Sam and Sky were in attendance.

Farah was glad, having seen the stress and strain had taken its toll on bum. He’d been the only one of their number left at Alfea by Rosalind, and carried a heavy burden of guilt that he’d escaped her wrath mostly unscathed. Farah tried to point out he’d suffered just as much as they had, that he hadn’t had it easy being the one left behind who had to protect their students and try to find a way to them both but Ben was having none of it.

Still, as Farah sipped her tea and watched him regale the teenagers with yet another story from their teachers time as students at Alfea, careful to edit out any bad moments, she was pleased to see the tension ease from his shoulders. His smiles came more readily, as she was used to, and the edges he’d developed during Rosalind’s short lived return began to soften again.

On evenings away from their students, they sat in the greenhouse in companionable quiet. She’d confessed that the smell of soil made her uneasy and he’d taken it in his stride, slowly welcoming her back into the domain that he considered home and she considered an extension of him. 

He was patient with her as they sat together, surrounded by plants he nurtured with love and care. He paid her the same care and attention as he did the young shrubs, and slowly helped her regain her sense of peace.

In return, Farah was able to take away the last of his guilt and regret, giving him a purpose, a way to feel useful and - unnecessarily to her eyes - a way to make amends for being unable to save her from Rosalind’s wrath.

IV. Saul

It took her two days after her return and Rosalind’s departure to notice Saul was avoiding her. 

No, that wasn’t right.

He was always there, always on the edge of her consciousness, but always keeping a distance.

Sometimes, she’d swear he was right behind her, her sense of him so strong, but when she turned around, she just caught the tail end of his shadow as he disappeared behind a corner.

She felt him watching her even when she couldn’t see him, felt the instinctive awareness that only came with his being in close proximity to her even though he wasn’t there. 

Ben told her gently to give him time, so Farah resolved to do just that.

In hindsight, she should have realised that it was only a matter of time before one of them broke. 

Nightmares weren’t uncommon since her death and subsequent resurrection. She woke up most nights trying to catch her breath, her magic wound tightly around her like a snake poised to strike.

She should have known he wasn’t oblivious to them, just as she should have recognised that not all of the nightmares she experienced were her own. 

After waking up from a particularly vivid dream she couldn’t explain, where she’d been digging and digging through the dirt with her bare hands, only to find her own.l body buried beneath the dead flowers and tangled roots, Farah felt the strong urge for some fresh air. She made it to the bench outside her classroom window before she realised with a stifled sob that the hands in her dream hadn’t been hers, and that the nightmare itself belonged to him, too.

When he joined her a few moments later, as silent as a shadow as he joined her on the bench, Farah was careful to keep her gaze fixed ahead, half expecting him to disappear again if she turned her head to look at him.

“I felt it,” he told her gruffly, breaking the silence that fell between them.

“The nightmares?” 

“No.”

Knowing when to push and when not to, she held her tongue and waited for him to speak, trusting that he would when he was ready.

“I felt you die,” he admitted brokenly. “I felt it.”

Her breath caught in her throat. “I... It was only for a few minutes,” she managed weakly.

“8 minutes, 46 seconds,” Saul clarified with a bleak smile. “Felt like longer.”

She couldn’t remember being dead; she knew she’d died, knew she’d come back. The magic she used to trick Rosalind called for it, and she hadn’t know when she cast it that she’d actually wake up at all. When she had, she’d panicked, clawed her way to the surface and inhaled as deeply as she could while her mind filled in hazy details of the traumatising event that had led her to the moment. 

She hadn’t thought, nor for a moment, that Saul would feel it. That he’d sense the loss of her.

“Oh, Saul.” Tears stung her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry you had to go through that.”

“You’re sorry I had to go through that?” He laughed incredulously, a humourless sound, but turned slightly on the bench to face her. “You _died_ , Farah, and you’re apologising to me?”

“You shouldn’t have had to go through that,” she said guiltily. 

“Neither should you,” he said bitterly. “I should have been here. I should have been able to protect you.”

“Protect me?” Farah repeated. “How could you have done that? If you hadn’t been arrested, she would have killed us both. I’m glad you weren’t here. If she’d have killed you...” The tears came back with a vengeance, stinging her green fiercely. “God, Saul. No. As much as I wish you hadn’t been arrested, it was a far better outcome than you being here with Rosalind.”

“Having felt you die, I beg to differ.”

At an impasse, Farah could only shrug helplessly. She wrung her hands in her lap, not noticing until he reached over to still them. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding me?” She asked quietly, staring down at their entwined fingers rather than looking up at him.

“I’ve not been avoiding you, Farah,” he told her just as quietly. “I’ve barely let you out of my sight for weeks. I just couldn’t be close to you, not without remembering.” He exhaled on a shaky sigh and she was surprised at how close it sounded. Glancing up, she found he’d shifted closer to her on the bench. His grey eyes locked with hers, shimmering with guilt and other emotions she wouldn’t dare try to identify. “I let you down.”

“No. No, you didn’t. You couldn’t.” She shook her head, squeezed his fingers with his. “You were my anchor,” she confessed, steeling herself for his reaction, whatever it would be. “I didn’t have time to think it through, I had to focus on something or something that I felt connected to strongly enough to bring me back. I don’t know if that’s why you felt it, and I’m sorry if it is, I should have used the school or...”

His lips, soft and searching, silenced her. It was a sweet and tentative kiss, not their first but the first in a long time. Her eyes slid shut as she signed into the kiss, her forehead coming to rest against his as it came to a natural end.

“You are my anchor, too,” he told her softly. “And I never want to feel what it’s like to live in this world without you again.”

She couldn’t promise he wouldn’t, just as he couldn’t make any promises to her. Life was uncertain, and there were certainly many dangers on the horizon. So instead she tilted her face, kissed him again, and promised silently that she’d do everything she could to stay with him.

V. New Traditions

And so it begun.

One night a week, their unlikely family would get together, either in Farah’s office or in a larger communal but private area of the school. They’d laugh and joke, and the younger generation would tease out stories from the older generation’s youth. 

Though Farah and Saul weren’t overt in their affection towards one another, they would sit together and exchange glances and smiles that were noted but never commented on by their companions.

Out of the ashes of grief, a new closeness was born.

A closeness that would get them through the trials that were yet to come.

#


End file.
